Electronic devices that display symbols, applications for displaying the symbols, techniques for acquiring the symbols, and even the symbols themselves are evolving and proliferating. The perennial quest for speed, efficiency, and broadening functionality is presently directed towards the electronic transport, processing, and display of characters from an expanding universe of symbols that are rendered on a growing variety of devices. The formulation of efficient mechanisms for storing, moving, and processing a wide array of fonts must account for constraints on device memory, processing speed, network bandwidth, and the established legacy of font processing software.
Some prior methods for provisioning fonts may seek to overcome storage, processing, bandwidth, and software limitations by abridging the font supply available to a particular device or process. Reducing the reservoir of available characters can have the undesirable effect of limiting a device's capability for properly rendering a diverse assortment of font-based documents.